


a shift in the gravity

by kaidariel (ksherambles)



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: (so much character development), Anger born of worry, Apologies, F/M, Feelings, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Mass Effect 2, Overthinking, PenShep, Pre-Relationship, Pre-Shepard/Garrus Vakarian, Sole Survivor (Mass Effect), Spacer (Mass Effect), blink and you'll miss it classics reference, calibrations?? again? I got fed up and therefore so did Shepard, how do you exit a conversation when you don't want to leave?, how do you prove to others you're working on yourself, i ship garrus/character development, kind of feelings realization, now edited to fix a formatting flub, that awkward bit in me2 when garrus WILL NOT talk to you, the feelings are there but the definitions maybe not, the kid's grown so much but there's no one there to see it, things not said
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:20:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22658464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ksherambles/pseuds/kaidariel
Summary: Sometime in the middle of ME2, before Garrus' loyalty mission, Shepard tries to put her foot down about Garrus' isolation. The conversation goes a little sideways.(...in all the weeks we've been traveling together-" a little crease was forming between her eyes, "Has it really never occurred to you that you might want to talk to someone-" Garrus snorted. "--who has personal experience losing her unit to a trap?")
Relationships: Female Shepard & Garrus Vakarian, Female Shepard/Garrus Vakarian, Shepard & Garrus Vakarian, Shepard/Garrus Vakarian
Comments: 5
Kudos: 48





	a shift in the gravity

"I think you've been selling me short," said Shepard.

Garrus turned to look at her, standing in the doorway of the battery. Her arms were crossed. With all the light behind her, her face was almost invisible.

"Sorry?" he said, for lack of a better response.

She entered and sat on a discarded crate to his left. He ought to have gotten rid of those, but the battery only had the one chair. He was busy, and therefore poor company, but he kept the extra seats.

Shepard leaned forwards, her elbows on her knees, her hands clasped. "You've been selling me short, Garrus," she repeated. "You're grieving, and I know the Thanix cannon falls out of sync if someone breathes on it funny. But, in all the weeks we've been traveling together--" a little crease was forming between her eyes, "Has it really never occurred to you that you might want to talk to someone--"

Garrus snorted.

"--who has personal experience losing her unit to a trap?"

Oh.

His mandibles flared in recognition, at least until the right one twinged in pain. "It never even --damn it, Shepard, I'm sorry." He pulled up another crate, a taller one, and sat.

Shepard looked away. "You know that it's Cerberus' fault. Maybe not this cell, but it's the same many-headed monster."

"A hydra. You told me about them on the SR-1."

That earned him a smile.

"Shepard.”

She looked back at him

“You said you were hurting for people you trusted on this ship. I've been brushing you off. I can't imagine what that looked like to you."

"I'm choosing to keep believing you're just preoccupied. And I'm not asking you not to be," she added, holding up a hand. "A lot of things changed in two years. But sometimes it doesn't feel like _I_ died. It feels like everyone else did."

Garrus leaned forwards. "Am I really...am I really that different to you?"

Shepard let out a breath. "No. You're just...older. More responsible, maybe. Maybe I _am_ the one who got left behind." Her eyes squinted with humor. "Maybe I'm jealous. You used to look at me like Grunt does now, like you were studying me and couldn't figure out what you saw."

Garrus coughed, something multilayered and complicated, and ducked his head slightly.

Shepard blinked. "What is it?"

"Ah. Nothing, really. You just reminded me of something Wrex said to me once." He rubbed the back of his neck. Was that ruefulness, in a turian? "I owe him a good kick in the shin."

"For being right or wrong?"

Garrus made a noncommittal noise. "Thanks for stopping by, Shepard. I'm sorry.” His hands rested, palm up, on his knees. “Don't count me out just yet."

" _Never_."

Garrus stared. What did that tone even mean, in a human voice?

Shepard looked away first. She stood, patting the shoulder of his armor as she passed. "Tali wants to talk to you, by the way. And the mess sergeant. I think he likes a challenge. Don't be a stranger upstairs."

"Shepard?"

She turned back from the door. Her face was obscured again, but her cropped hair looked like it was on fire.

"Does it --damn, I feel like a cliche. _Does_ it get any better?"

There was a moment of silence. "It changes. Either you change how you carry it, or you change how it carries you. Both, for me. But at the end of the day, I still recognized myself in the mirror. Underneath everything, still me, both the good and the bad."

Garrus nodded. "Thanks. I think."

"I'll be around if you need me."

"You know where to find me," said Garrus gesturing with one hand.

"Yeah," said Shepard, "I do."

She turned and walked away, a trailing hand hitting the doorframe as she passed.

**Author's Note:**

> I yell about Garrus' character development between the games on tumblr


End file.
